Tag: Ancient Rome
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Rome is Home
When I returned from the 2017 summer field season, I was riding high on optimism for my archaeological career but running on fumes for money. Very fortunately, though, the stars aligned and offered me not one but two promotions in about a month’s time, providing me the means to stabilize my finances. Since this is…
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Happens Every Time
What a whirlwind! I’m writing this post after finally making it home to Baltimore from a tiny detour in Rome and, before that, blazing all around the island-nation of Cyprus, where visits and trips included places like the Cyprus American Archaeological Institute (CAARI), and the ancient sites of Kourion and Paphos. These were all after…
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The Plow-Zone
The past couple of weeks have been quite busy at Aeclanum. My trench (Saggio 8) received two, bright eyed, bushy tailed new participants who were eager to dive deep into all the mysteries that the archaeology of Aeclanum holds. What are those mysteries? In case you missed my post from the last block, our trench’s…
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Charles IV, a couple Alpine border crossings, and a quagmire of red tape.
Well everybody, it’s been a long time coming but the field season is finally here (and after too much delay, the first blog post of the season as well!). I’m finally in the field…digging. There is a verifiable amount of dirt on my trowel so it’s official! It has (quite literally) been a long road…
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Part One (b): Who was Suetonius?
Now that we’ve gotten to know Plutarch, let’s ask: Who was Suetonius? Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus was born ca. 70 AD, at the ascendancy of the Flavian dynasty (emperors Vespasian, Titus, and Domitian). Unlike Plutarch, Suetonius was born a Roman citizen into an equestrian family. His father initially served as tribune in the short-lived faction of emperor Otho…
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Part One (a): Who is Plutarch?
In the introduction, we established that in order to conduct a valuable, critical reading of ancient literature, the reader must take time to understand who is writing, why they are writing, and who was the author’s intended audience. Let’s start here with the first “Who?” The information I have gathered here can primarily be found…
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Introduction: Researching Roman Biographical Literature
As mentioned before, one of the primary focuses of my research is to conduct a critical reading of classical literature to address the question: “How did the Ancient Romans perceive the sociopolitical changes of the last century BC and first century AD, summarized by the end of the Republic and beginning of the Empire?” For those…
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R&R
Apologies for the delayed post. As the title of this post suggests, I’ve been enjoying some (in my opinion) well deserved decompressing time. Nevertheless, I’m still here and I haven’t totally succumbed to the sweet repose of the French Riviera…yet. Last week was my final week at the Apolline Project. It was a bit melancholic to…
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Transitions
At the beginning of last week, we finally concluded digging to the bottom of our rubble context to find a “preparation layer.” While digging in a hole that was getting deeper than I am tall is my idea of a good time, both Ferdinando and the hard-packed surface of concrete stopped us from going any…
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“Another day, another context”
The past week has been a bit long. We’ve continued digging our trench and gone more than a meter below the surface. We’ve been moving through a new context every day, each one approximately 20cm thick. In terms of moving soil, that is kind of slow. In terms of doing paperwork and making drawings of…
The Starving Archaeologist 